Bangladesh’s new prime minister is sworn in after his party’s landslide election win

DHAKA, Bangladesh (AP) — Bangladesh’ s new prime minister was sworn in on Tuesday after his party’s landslide win in parliamentary elections last week, the country’s first since the massive 2024 uprising and a vote billed as key to the nation's future political landscape after years of intense rivalry and disputed polls.

Prime Minister Tarique Rahman, whose term will last for five years, is the son of former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia and former President Ziaur Rahman. He is also Bangladesh’s first male prime minister in 35 years. Since 1991, when Bangladesh returned to democracy, either Rahman's mother or her archrival Sheikh Hasina had served as prime ministers.

The country’s figurehead President Mohammed Shahabuddin administered the oath of office for Rahman. Dozens of Cabinet members and members of the new government were also being sworn in on Tuesday.

The Bangladesh Nationalist Party and its partners won 212 seats in the 350-memebr Parliament while an 11-party alliance led by the Jamaat-e-Islami party, the country’s largest Islamist party, won 77 seats to be the opposition.

A new party — the National Citizen Party, or NCP — formed by the student leaders who led the 2024 uprising was part of the 11-party alliance led by Jamaat-e-Islami. The NCP secured six seats.

In Bangladesh, voters elect 300 members of Parliament directly while the remaining 50 posts are reserved for women and distributed proportionately among the winning parties.

Rahman, 60, who returned to the country in December — after 17 years in self-exile in London and shortly before his mother’s death — has promised to work for democracy in Bangladesh, a country of 170 million people.

An interim government led by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Muhammad Yunus, that took over after Hasina was toppled, oversaw the election. The vote was largely peaceful and deemed as acceptable by international observers.

Foreign dignitaries and diplomats attended the ceremony Tuesday. Maldives President Mohamed Muizzu, Bhutanese Prime Minister Tshering Tobgay and an Indian delegation were among the guests, as well as dignitaries from Nepal, Sri Lanka and other countries.

Earlier on Tuesday morning, head of the election commission A.N.M. Nasir Uddin administered the oath of office separately to all the newly elected lawmakers.

But lawmakers from the BNP refused to take a second oath as members of a proposed Constitutional Reform Council in line with a referendum held simultaneously with Thursday's balloting. The interim government said the “Yes” side won the referendum and it made the arrangement with a set of reforms proposals to change the constitution keeping all the elected lawmakers as its members.

The referendum stemmed from a national charter in light of the uprising and major parties including the BNP signed it. Lawmakers elected from the Jamaat-e-Islami and its allies took the second oath, signaling complexity in the new Parliament.

The referendum refers political reforms that include prime ministerial term limits, stronger checks on executive power and other safeguards preventing parliamentary power consolidation. But critics say rising Islamists are pushing hard for its implementation while the referendum has some agenda that could even change the character of Bangladesh's largely secular constitution.

Rahman’s main rival Bangladesh Awami League party headed by Hasina — who was ousted in the 2024 mass uprising — was banned from the race. The Yunus-led administration also banned all activities of Hasina’s party, which had ruled the country for 15 years.

From her exile in India, where she has lived since Aug. 5, 2024, Hasina slammed the vote as unfair to her party, which still remains a major political force. At home, Hasina was sentenced to death on charges of crimes against humanity because of hundreds of deaths stemming from the uprising.

She denied the allegation and termed the court as a “kangaroo court.”

Chief Advisor of Bangladesh Professor Muhammad Yunus, right, congratulates Bangladesh's newly sworn in Prime Minister Tarique Rahman, after swearing in ceremony at the National Parliament in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Tuesday, Feb.17, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmud Hossain Opu)

Tarique Rahman, Chairperson of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, takes oath as Prime Minister of Bangladesh from President Mohammed Shahabuddin during a ceremony at the National Parliament in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Tuesday, Feb.17, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmud Hossain Opu)

President of Bangladesh Mohammed Shahabuddin, left, congratulates Tarique Rahman, Chairperson of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party after administering him oath of Prime Minister of Bangladesh at the National Parliament in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Tuesday, Feb. 17, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmud Hossain Opu)

Tarique Rahman, Chairperson of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, right, stand with Bangladesh President Mohammed Shahabuddin for national anthem after Rahman was sworn in as country's prime minister during a ceremony at the National Parliament in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Tuesday, Feb.17, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmud Hossain Opu)

Tarique Rahman, Chairperson of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party, takes oath as Prime Minister of Bangladesh from President Mohammed Shahabuddin, left, at the National Parliament in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Tuesday, Feb.17, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmud Hossain Opu)

Bangladesh Nationalist Party Chairperson Tarique Rahman, second right, speaks at a press conference after his party won the national parliamentary election, in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Saturday, Feb. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmud Hossain Opu)

Bangladesh Nationalist Party Chairperson Tarique Rahman shows victory sign during a meeting with media after his party won the national parliamentary election, in Dhaka, Bangladesh, Saturday, Feb. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Mahmud Hossain Opu)

NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. stock market is slipping Thursday after oil prices resumed their climb.

The S&P 500 fell 0.3% and is on track for a fourth drop in five days after setting its all-time high. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 83 points, or 0.2%, as of 1:01 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.4% lower.

A halt in the torrid run for stocks benefiting from the artificial-intelligence boom has slowed the U.S. market recently. Not even another better-than-expected profit report from Nvidia was enough to kick it back into gear.

The chip company reported stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected, while also forecasting revenue for the current quarter that cleared analysts’ estimates. “The buildout of AI factories — the largest infrastructure expansion in human history — is accelerating at extraordinary speed,” CEO Jensen Huang said.

But such performances and such talk have become routine, and Nvidia's stock swiveled between losses and gains before falling 1.4%.

Some analysts said the weakness may have simply been because investors were locking in profits after Nvidia’s stock had soared nearly 70% over the prior year, more than double the S&P 500’s 27% jump. The broad AI industry is also getting criticism for becoming too expensive, as well as too circular as Nvidia has bought ownership stakes in companies that use its own chips that drive Nvidia’s revenue.

Pressure built on Wall Street, meanwhile, as the price for a barrel of Brent crude oil climbed 1.7% to $106.81 and trimmed its loss for the week. Oil prices have been swinging up and down with uncertainty about how long the war with Iran will keep the Strait of Hormuz shut, which is preventing oil tankers from exiting the Persian Gulf to deliver crude.

The higher oil prices pushed Treasury yields upward in the bond market, resuming rises following a slowdown the day before.

Climbing yields have cranked up the pressure on financial markets worldwide. They're slowing economies and weighing on prices for stocks and all kinds of other investments. Besides driving up rates for mortgages, high yields could also curtail companies’ borrowing to build the AI data centers that have been supporting the U.S. economy’s growth recently.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.61% from 4.57% late Wednesday.

It had gotten near 4.63% in the morning, after a report gave the latest signal that the U.S. job market remains in better shape than economists expected. The number of U.S. workers applying for unemployment benefits last week unexpectedly declined in an indication of fewer layoffs.

But yields eased a bit following a mixed preliminary report showing weaker-than-expected growth for business activity among U.S. services businesses and improved growth for U.S. manufacturers. Companies are feeling the effects of accelerating inflation and are seeing subdued growth in their order books, the preliminary data from an S&P Global survey said.

“The damaging economic impact from the war in the Middle East is becoming increasingly evident in the business surveys,” according to Chris Williamson, chief business economist at S&P Global Market Intelligence.

Inflation is worsening even beyond the high oil prices caused by the Iran war, while U.S. households are showing widespread discouragement about the economy.

Elsewhere on Wall Street, Walmart fell 7.2% following its profit report. The retailer delivered another quarter of impressive revenue but offered up weaker forecasts for upcoming profit than analysts expected.

On the winning side of Wall Street was Ralph Lauren, which jumped 12.2% after reporting stronger profit and revenue for the latest quarter than analysts expected.

In stock markets abroad, indexes were mixed in Europe following bigger moves in Asia.

South Korea’s Kospi Kospi soared 8.4% thanks to strength for technology stocks. Samsung Electronics jumped 8.5% after its labor union and management reached an agreement late Wednesday that averted a strike. SK Hynix, a chip company partnering with Nvidia, surged 11.2%.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 jumped 3.1%, while indexes fell 1% in Hong Kong and 2% in Shanghai.

AP Business Writers Matt Ott and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed.

Trader Aaron Ford works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Thursday, May 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

Trader Edward McCarthy works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Wednesday, May 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

A Global Medical Response helicopter sits in front of the New York Stock Exchange before the planned IPO of GMR Solutions, Inc., Wednesday, May 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)

A person walks in front of an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Monday, May 18, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)

Currency traders watch monitors at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, May 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

A currency trader talks on the phone near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, left, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Wednesday, May 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)